1 Kings 19.9β-14:
| 19.9βוהנה דבר יהוה אליו | Look: Yahweh’s word to him. |
|---|---|
| ויאמר לו | He says to him, |
| מה לך פה אליהו׃ | “What’s this place to you, Eliyahu?”α |
| 19.10ויאמר קנא קנאתי | He says, “I am jealously jealous |
| ליהוה אלהי צבאות | to Yahweh, God of the Warriors,β |
| כי עזבו בריתך בני ישראל | but the sons of Isra’el loosen Your covenant, |
| את מזבחתיך הרסו | break Your altars, |
| ואת נביאיך הרגו בחרב | and smite Your prophets with the blade. |
| ואותר אני לבדי | I am left; I alone. |
| ויבקשו את נפשי לקחתה׃ | They seek my life,γ to take it.” |
| 19.11ויאמר צא | He says, “Go out. |
| ועמדת בהר לפני יהוה | Stand on the hill, before Yahweh’s face. |
| והנה יהוה עבר | Look, Yahweh crosses over.” |
| ורוח גדולה וחזק מפרק הרים | A great and loud wind rips the hills. |
| ומשבר סלעים | It bursts the rock formationsδ |
| לפני יהוה | before Yahweh’s face. |
| לא ברוח יהוה | (Yahweh is not in the wind.) |
| ואחר הרוח רעש | Behind the wind, a shaking. |
| לא ברעש יהוה׃ | (Yahweh is not in the shaking.) |
| 19.12ואחר הרעש אש | Behind the shaking, fire. |
| לא באש יהוה | (Yahweh is not in the fire.) |
| ואחר האש קול | Behind the fire, a voice— |
| דממה דקה׃ | quiet, very small. |
| 19.13ויהי כשמע אליהו | It becomes, as Eliyahu listens to it, |
| וילט פניו באדרתו | he veils his face with his robe. |
| ויצא | He goes out. |
| ויעמד פתח המערה | He stands at the opening of the cave. |
| והנה אליו קול ויאמר | Look: A voice to him. It says, |
| מה לך פה אליהו׃ | “What’s this place to you, Eliyahu?” |
| 19.14ויאמר קנא קנאתי | He says, “I am jealously jealous |
| ליהוה אלהי צבאות | to Yahweh, God of the Warriors,β |
| כי עזבו בריתך בני ישראל | but the sons of Isra’el loosen Your covenant, |
| את מזבחתיך הרסו | break Your altars, |
| ואת נביאיך הרגו בחרב | and smite Your prophets with the blade. |
| ואותר אני לבדי | I am left; I alone. |
| ויבקשו את נפשי לקחתה׃ | They seek my life,γ to take it.” |
Whenever I’ve heard this passage discussed, it’s usually with the idea that Elijah wasn’t supposed to be there. He wasn’t listening to God properly; Jezebel’s death threat threw him into a panic; he ran all the way to Arabia like a frightened child; he should have had the Spirit-inspired guts to stand up to Jezebel and tell her where to get off; instead he’s whining at God how he’s the only prophet left.
The other sermons usually get into how God wasn’t in the wind, wasn’t in the shaking, wasn’t in the fire, but was in the still small voice. So don’t expect Him to answer your questions with impressive weather. (Even though He answers people with impressive weather in Exodus 20, Job 38, John 12, and other places.)
All right, let’s get to my usual theme of how the context of the scriptures proves that the popular interpretations are all crap.
Going to Horeb wasn’t Elijah’s idea. Elijah left Israel with the intent of leaving his servant boy in southern Judah, then wandering into the desert to die. Horeb wasn’t Elijah’s idea. Death was his idea. God intervened in this plan by sending a messenger to feed Elijah, and gave him the miraculous strength to travel 40 days through the wilderness until he reached and climbed Horeb.
God’s question, “What’s this place to you?” is a Hebrew idiom meaning, “Why are you here?” When He asked this question of Elijah, he didn’t mean by it, “What are you doing here, Elijah, when you’re supposed to be in Israel standing up to Jezebel?” Going to Horeb wasn’t Elijah’s idea. It was God’s. That being the case, God’s question was really, “Why did I bring you here?”
Now that we understand this, let’s look at Elijah’s answer again. He’s not whining to God. God brought him to Horeb—which is also known as Sinai, which is the mountain from which God thundered the Ten Commandments, the mountain where Moses went 40 days without food (and remember, Elijah had just traveled through the desert for 40 days without food) while God carved His covenant on stone slabs and gave it to Moses to stick in the Ark of the covenant. God brought him to probably the most significant mountain in Hebrew history, ever. It’s the very mountain where God outlined how His relationship with His people is supposed to work.
Why did God bring Elijah here? Because, Elijah believed, he was “jealously jealous”—a Hebrew idiom meaning “the most jealous person”—to Yahweh, God of the Warriors. Jealous, of course, in a good way. Jealousy means to want people to devote themselves towards something they currently aren’t. Usually when we’re jealous, it’s because people aren’t devoting themselves to us. But we aren’t meant to receive devotion. People are only to devote themselves to God. Elijah is jealous in the proper way—jealous on God’s behalf. He wants people to devote themselves to God. And considering the way Israel has been behaving, it feels like he’s the only one that feels this way. So, he’s jealously jealous.
While he’s jealous for God, the rest of Israel is violating God’s covenant with them every which way. They’re breaking laws, smashing altars, killing prophets. They want to kill him. (Well, only Jezebel wants to kill him; and maybe some of the families of those prophets he slaughtered.)
So since Elijah is the only one left in Israel who’s interested in God, why has God brought him to Horeb, the place where it all began? Well, quite obviously, because God’s gonna have to wash His hands of Israel and start over; and since Elijah is the only Yahwist left, God’s gonna start with Elijah.
Totally wrong answer. God will correct him in a moment. But Elijah is pretty sure he’s got the right answer. After all, he gives it exactly the same way twice. (He’s probably even more sure he’s got it right after he sees wind, shaking, and fire, just like Horeb was acting when God first gave the Ten Commandments.)
The point of the author of this scripture commenting how God wasn’t in the wind, shaking, and fire, is mainly ’cause people confuse scary weather with God, just like all those idiots that think hurricanes hit cities because God is angry with the cities. As Jesus demonstrates elsewhere, weather and God are two different things.
However, God is not always revealed in some still small voice within us. Sometimes that voice is just indigestion. Sometimes God is revealed in the big loud voice of nature. Use the discernment He gave us to figure it out. Meanwhile, don’t assume from this one passage that the normal way God speaks is through tiny voices in the back of caves. There is no normal way. God does it in whatever way He feels like—usually in the way that’ll make the greatest impact upon the individual human. The tiny voice worked for Elijah. The bright light worked for Paul. The burning bush worked for Moses. Freaky visions worked for Zechariah. Marrying whores worked for Hosea. Glow-in-the-dark Jesus worked for John. You see my point.
α. Elijah.
β. Usu. “hosts,” meaning “[heavenly] armies.”
γ. Or “soul.”
δ. Usu. “rocks,” but it has the sense of the rocks that mountains are made of.
